DescriptionScientific American presents a collection of key scientific essays written by Nobel Prize winners Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr, I.I. Rabi, and Leon Lederman. Einstein's essay, "On the Generalized Theory of Gravitation" (originally published in SA…
DescriptionMerely accruing additional years beyond the biblical span of three score and 10 would be unwelcome if they just prolonged suffering from illness and infirmity. No, we want to live better, more youthful days while we're living longer. Diet, exercise and a lucky draw from the gene pool can take us only so far, however. That's where science comes in. In this special edition from Scientific American, you'll find firsthand reports from the researchers leading the efforts to understand the mechanisms of aging. They are teasing out ways to slow the biological clock as well as the degradation that time imposes on our bodies and minds. They are battling the diseases of age, including cancer and heart disease. Medicine will continue to advance, and, we expect, society and policymakers will have to learn to adapt to the challenges of longevity-both providing it and providing for it-that await us all.
DescriptionWhat kind of mischief can result from misunderstanding the monetary system? The work of 2 obscure Scottish chemists destroyed the presidential prospects of William Jennings Bryan, as well as Franklin D. Roosevelt's decision to appease a few senators from the American West who helped communism triumph in China, are just 2 such mishaps cited in this important work by Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman. This accessible work also provides an in-depth discussion on the creation of value: from stones to feathers to gold; the central role of monetary theory and how it can act to ignite or deepen inflation; and what the present monetary system means for both the domestic and global economy.
DescriptionThe year was 1944. The village of Sighet in Hungary had been grasped by the evil and unrelenting hand of Hitler, and its people hurtled down into the black depths of annihilation. For the next year, young Elie Wiesel witnessed the agonizing, tortured death of all he loved - family, friends, and religious devotion. Birkenua, Auschwitz, Buna, Buchenwald . That he survived these death camps is a miracle even he finds impossible to comprehend. Night is Wiesel's memoir of the Holocaust as told through the eyes of a 15-year-old. The author was awarded the Congressional Medal of Freedom in 1985, and in 1986 the Nobel Peace Prize for his enduring efforts to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive so that such a tragedy would not repeat itself.
DescriptionWith his characteristic eyebrow-raising behavior, Richard P. Feynman once provoked the wife of a Princeton dean to remark, "Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman!" But the many scientific and personal achievements of this Nobel Prize-winning physicist are no laughing matter. In addition to solving the mystery of liquid helium, Feynman has been commissioned to paint a naked female toreador and asked to crack the uncrackable safes guarding the atomic bomb's most critical secrets. He has traded ideas with Einstein and Bohr, discussed gambling odds with Nick the Greek, and accompanied a ballet on the bongo drums. Here, woven with his scintillating views on modern science, Feynman relates the defining moments of his accomplished life.
